


It’s all over now, Baby Blue

by orphan_account



Category: IT - Stephen King
Genre: I wanted to make this somewhat sad so let me know if it worked, and florida, and new chapters will be added on later and theyll just be some more scenes, i just rlly love publix, ok so, sad and bittersweet, the first chapter is gonna be what i have so far, this is basically my love letter to florida, this is entirely based off the area where i live and doesnt represent other counties and or cities, through the eyes of mike, which is just a few little scattered scenes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-17 07:21:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21050504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Mike moves to Florida after it’s all over





	It’s all over now, Baby Blue

**Author's Note:**

> Ok this has been kinda ongoing on my tumblr (stanlonbrough) and i was getting antsy and thirsty for attention so here it is!! Some of it!! Let me know if theres anything wrong, like grammar, spelling, or if a section doesnt seem ‘finished’ 
> 
> I hope yall like it :’)
> 
> Title is from the song ‘its all over now, baby blue’ by bob dylan!! I had been playing with it for a while but then heard the perfect lyrics so i HAD to use it!!

Mike never thought he would actually make it. 

But here he is. On the road to florida. Fucking florida. He still can't believe it. 

Hes unused to how the hot air blows on his skin as he flies down the highway. It's late at night and he's astounded by the number of people still driving. He loves it. 

He loves the smell of rain in the air, the heat wafting through, the lights from the cities as he drives closer and closer to his destination. He feels alive in a way he hasn't since he was 13 years old. 

The wind whipping in his face causes his eyes to dry out. He blinks and a tear streams down his face. He blames it on the wind. 

-

His house is quaint but most certainly never quiet. 

He had saved up enough money while he was working as a librarian in Derry to buy a nice house in Florida which was exactly what he wanted. It's also on a swamp which is certainly… something. 

The first night he stays there, he sleeps on a mattress on the floor with three blankets and a couple of pillows. He wakes up at 3 am sweating and throws the blankets from the bed and falls back asleep. He wakes up 30 minutes later still sweating through his pajamas so he gets up and turns on the fan. It's still hot. He’ll have to get his air conditioner working fucking soon. 

As he lies in bed trying to go back to sleep for the third time that night, he listens. He listens to the cicadas roaring, the frogs croaking, and crickets playing their night time tunes. It's all so different from the strange hum that came to Derry in it’s moments of silence, that he feels a strange homesickness. The difference of it all is what gets him. The fact that he’s so far away from the place he thought he would be trapped forever. He finally escaped. 

A laugh bubbles up from deep in his chest. It would startle him if it hadn’t been sitting there since he first crossed the Florida state line, so he revels in it. He laughs and laughs, giggles and chokes on his spit until he can’t breathe. He laughs so loud and hard and freely until it mingles with the sounds of the night and suddenly there's a symphony around him. He adds his own instrument to the orchestra and his own feels complete. After being torn apart, the completeness is a pretty nice feeling. 

His chest is heaving and he’s sure he’s laughing loud enough for his neighbors to hear and subsequently be worried about but right now, he couldn't care less. 

He quiets down eventually, after a long time of laughing so hard he has to catch his breath. He has tears in the corners of his eyes and he blinks to let them run down his cheeks. He feels suddenly exhausted. The long day of driving finally taking its toll.

He falls asleep for the final time that night with a smile on his face and a thank you on the tip of his tongue. 

-

He found himself in a Publix grocery store on his third day. 

He was hungry and instead of ordering take out or eating out for the hundredth time in a row, he decided to test out the oven that he bought the day before. He asked the man at the appliance store if he knew any good grocery stores and the man laughed. You must be from far, far away, my friend, he chuckled. Down in florida, its publix or bust and you look like the type of man who enjoys a good sandwich every once in a while. Everyone here shops at publix. I ain't ever met one who doesn't. 

Mike thanked the man and left with his oven, not thinking much about anything other than trying to memorize the strange name. 

So here he is at the main entrance to what seems to be a super grocery store. The colors are a nice green and khaki color (which stirs something deeply settled in his chest) and the atmosphere is strange. Its feels comforting but sets him on edge. He grabs a cart and strolls down to the side, looking above to check out what's in each isle. 

He finds the dairy area and grabs some milk and yogurt. One thing he wants to try is a better diet and the best time to start is now, he thinks to himself as he hums quietly. 

He makes his way through the store, enjoying its options and variety. He buys some eggs, some fruit, some spices, and finally meanders his way to the cheese and deli section. He notices a line and thinks it for the hot foods that you can pick and choose, but the sign above the area reads ‘Sub line starts here’ and he thinks to himself, here goes nothing.

-

Mike hanlon falls in love with the ocean. 

No, not just the ocean, he falls in love with the beach

The feeling comes like a wave crashing down, pushing him into the sand he walks on, sinking his roots deeper into the limestone that florida rests on. 

The warm, brilliant sun shining above him reminds him of his mother’s smile and glittering water reminds him of his father’s eyes when he was particularly proud of something mike had done. 

The sand beneath his toes is almost too hot for him to handle but he keeps marching on to the water's edge, setting up his umbrella and towel and unpacking his little basket. 

The sound of people and radios and laughter is drowned out by the sound of the waves and the gulls. The lone airplane circling around the coast with an advertisement whipping around in the wind tied to the end. He thinks its deafening and beautifully quiet all at once. 

He sits and lets the sunscreen sink in as he eats some grapes he brought for a snack. He finds himself stalling by eating the orange he also brought. 

He sits and basks and finally understands the lizards and snakes he sees on rocks and fence posts and sidewalks. He feels like he's coming back to life after a winter that wasn’t even all that cold. 

He finally gets up, tucking his plate back into his basket, then he trots off to the water, footsteps uneven on the sand he’s unused to. 

He first lets the water brush his toes, feeling the nice cool relief from the hot air. He steps closer and the tide moves out. He walks and walks until eventually he’s up to his waist. 

He stands and just lets the water flow forwards and backwards, pulling him along with it. He can feel it beckoning to him like the rip current the woman at the desk of the hotel warned him about and it's almost too convincing. Almost. 

The sun is high above him and as he hears children splash and laugh he can’t help but feel like he's been here before. Maybe without the salt in the air or suffocating humidity and scalding hot sand, but the barrens were like this all the same. 

The sky is a gorgeous, uninterrupted blue and the clouds are just wispy little things above him and mike hanlon has fallen in love. 

-

The peacocks come during his third month. 

Hes mostly settled in now and knows his way around town enough to be comfortable. He decorated his house with little bits and bobs he finds: shells, rocks, cool twigs, feathers, and of course little junkie tourist trap shit that he happens to love. He thinks its brightens the place up a bit. Makes it more fun. The paint inside the house is a strange mix of colors including but not limited to, green in the kitchen, purple in the dining room, red for the living room, and yellow for the hallway. His own room is a nice deep and comforting navy blue and he stuck stars to the ceiling as well. After so many years of being an adult long before his time was due, he thinks he deserves some child-like wonder. 

He tries not to think about how this is his 40 year old man version of a nightlight. 

His yard is loved and tended to; he's been planting hydrangeas, hibiscus, milkweed, and almost any other flower he can get his hands on. He tries for the native kinds but sometimes something pretty catches his eye and he can’t deny himself. 

Its one when hes edging his lawn that he sees it. 

A pile of shit. 

It's no dog shit, that's for sure. Mike honestly can’t even tell what it is or what it belongs to. Florida wildlife already freaks him out a bit with all the lizards- he doesn’t want to know who’s shit it is. 

But then he sees it. 

Its beautiful, long tail feathers, the wispy greens browns and blues, the beautiful purple and teal leading up to it’s elegant neck and majestic head. 

A peacock. 

Mike had only seen them in books and at the zoo when his parents had saved up enough money for a weekend trip, but with no cage in between them, it's as if he's seeing one for the first time. He’s barely breathing when he takes a step forward. 

Then the peacock decides to take a nice peck at the freshly shined silver bumper of his truck. 

He then realizes who’s shit he’s just stepped in. 

The moment is automatically ruined and he tries to shoo the bird away. It works for a little while, and mike laughs as it runs away looking awkward and ridiculous with its tail feathers flopping up and down in the wind. But then it comes back, this time it comes close to him. Not quite close enough for him to reach out and touch, but enough to make it seem like the bird is curious. 

Stan would probably be able to tell, Mike thinks. The thought comes unbidden and he’s a blindsided by it, since he doesn’t even know anyone named stan. He blinks at himself and obviously takes too long to react for the peacocks standards so it decides to let out a shrill, uncanny, and very strange scream. 

Mike falls over in shock and the peacock continues to make its noise, almost as if it's laughing at him. Mike gets up and runs the bird away and out of his yard, grumbling under his breath and taking awkward steps to avoid the poop spots that had before gone unnoticed. The entire time he can’t help but think the bird reminds him of someone very specific. 

He spends the rest of the night trying to remember who. 

-

One thing mike tries not to think about is the overwhelming guilt he can’t seem to escape. 

He hated it. Some nights he could barely sleep because of it. 

Today the radio is playing some oldies channel it seems to be stuck on, but Mike isn't complaining. The songs are fun and nostalgic and make him feel better in the afternoon heat. 

Both the guilt and heat are completely suffocating. 

Hes washing old pots he got from his neighbor, an old lady whos probably half blind and definitely left the pots to break and grow moss. Hes using a pressure washer as he scrubs, needing to make them impeccable. He doesnt know who hes trying to impress. 

The next song that comes on catches him off guard- not expecting the harmonica to start playing so suddenly. Its catchy and sweet and seems almost more like a warble and drifting showman who you would pass by on a dirt road, but Mike supposes that's just how Bob Dylan sounds. 

He sits among the shrubbery and banana trees and green green grass of his backyard and sits in the summer heat as he scrubs his pots, feeling guilty as all hell over something he can’t remember. 

He’s hums vaguely along to the tune, improvising any parts he doesn't know when the scratchy voice sings in the background, in between the water bursts of his hose and the scrubbing of his sponge and brush, ‘Forget the dead you've left, they will not follow you’ and Mike stops dead in his tracks. 

He feels like he can't breathe and tears prick at the corners of his eyes, his chest begins to heave slightly, and the air comes in little hiccups. Sweat is dripping down his face and his sponge is dripping soap onto the concrete as he cried heavily through the rest of the song, feeling forlorn, lonely, and, despite it all, a little happy too.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know if i should add anymore sections and tell me what you want to see!! Also come talk to me about florida man mike on my tumblr!! :)


End file.
